Tag Archives: Oscar Isaac

DUNE (2021) – Latest Film Version of Frank Herbert Novel Needs Spicing Up

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For a movie about spices, DUNE (2021) isn’t all that zesty.

Yes, one of the main plot points in DUNE is that the most valuable commodity in the universe these days is spices, mostly because in the future in which these people live, it’s the main ingredient in their ships’ warp drives, and so the races that control the spice trade have all the power. It’s the oil of its day.

DUNE is based on the celebrated science fiction novel by Frank Herbert, and it was filmed once before in 1984 by director David Lynch, with mixed results.

Denis Villeneuve is at the helm this time around. Villeneuve directed one of my favorite movies of the past few years, SICARIO (2015), which was my pick for the top movie that year. He also directed the well-respected BLADE RUNNER 2049 (2017). So I was excited to see what he would bring to this project.

And what he brought was a visual style and mood to this piece which plays out in a deliberate fashion that keeps this one intriguing yet low key throughout. I was always interested, but I was never excited. Not a good thing for a two and half hour movie.

The biggest problem with the story told in this version of DUNE is it’s all about potential and never really focuses on the here and now. It’s the story of young Paul Atreides (Timothee Chalamet) who’s the son of Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac), whose people have inherited control over the much sought-after spice planet when the emperor rules that the current owners move out and Atreide’s people move in. Paul is the heir to the dukedom, but more so, he’s viewed as a “chosen one” by the indigenous race who lives on the spice planet who have been fighting their oppressors for independence for generations.

Amidst deceit and war over the spices, Paul is destined to emerge as an all powerful leader in the struggle for independence. But alas, that’s the story for another movie! As young Chani (Zendaya) tells him near the film’s conclusion, “this is just the beginning.”

Um, no it’s not. This is the END of the movie, sweetheart.

And that’s the biggest problem I had with this version of DUNE. The entire two hours and thirty five minutes are spent setting up the next movie. Why not just skip all this stuff and get to the part of the story you want to tell? I found this exceedingly frustrating.

The screenplay by Villeneuve, Jon Spaihts, and Eric Roth doesn’t help. Nearly every character in this movie is wooden and sleep-inducing, the situations slow and uninspiring, and the action scenes few and far between. This one could have used a heavy dose of some of those valued spices, that’s for sure! And these guys are seasoned screenwriters— heh, heh— with lots of credits. You’d think this screenplay would have struck gold. But it doesn’t. It’s all so bland.

The best part of DUNE is its cast, which reads like a who’s-who of tough guys and superhero movie veterans.

Timothee Chalamet gets the lead role here as Paul Atreides, and he acquits himself quite well. Chalamet has delivered strong performances in such films as LADY BIRD (2017) and LITTLE WOMEN (2019), but I liked him even more here as Paul Atreides. It’s a quiet understated performance, which Chalamet does well. I enjoyed his performance throughout the movie, but I just kept waiting for him to do something, which again is the main problem with this movie. Chalamet provides some great acting with an interesting character, but if you want to see him do something significant, you will have to wait until the next movie.

Oscar Isaac is very good as Paul’s honest and well-respected father, Duke Leto, who rules with great integrity. Which means he doesn’t stand a chance in this world of brutal and vicious dictators. Isaac is an excellent actor who played Poe Dameron in the new STAR WARS trilogy, but he’s delivered far more notable performances in such films as EX MACHINA (2014) and OPERATION FINALE (2018). Isaac turns in another solid performance here.

Rebecca Ferguson is on hand as Paul’s mystic mother Lady Jessica, and she’s very good as well. While not as memorable as she was as the menacing Rose the Hat in DOCTOR SLEEP (2019), she does achieve better results than her last turn as Mae, the mysterious stranger who walks into Hugh Jackman’s life in the recent subpar science fiction tale REMINISCENCE (2021).

Jason Momoa, Aquaman himself, plays Duncan Idaho, a loyal warrior for the Atreides family. Momoa as he almost always does imbues his character with a charismatic personality, so much so, that it’s too bad he’s not in the movie more. He gets some of the film’s best scenes. He’s not in this one nearly enough. It was good to see Momoa on top of his game again, after seeing him in the pretty lame actioner SWEET GIRL (2021) earlier this year.

Josh Brolin, who played the most infamous Marvel superhero movie villain yet, Thanos, in the AVENGERS films, here plays Gurney Halleck, the Duke’s head of security. Halleck could have used some of Thanos’ superpowers in this one. And Dave Bautista, who plays Drax in the GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY and the AVENGERS movies, plays Beast Rabban Harkonnen, one of the baddies, but Bautista is barely in this one and hardly makes an impact.

Faring better is Stellan Skarsgard as Baron Vladimir Harkonnen, the main villain in the movie. Sure, he’s practically unrecognizable under CGI, motion capturing effects, and make-up, but he still delivers one of the better performances in the movie. Skarsgard is a superior actor with a ton of credits, who today is largely known for his role as scientist Erik Selvig in the Marvel THOR and AVENGERS movies.

The same can be said for Javier Bardem, who appears briefly as Stilgar, the leader of the indigenous race fighting for their independence on the spice planet. He only has a couple of scenes, but he makes his mark in each of them. Bardem is another superior actor with a long and varied career, and he played one of the more memorable Bond villains in recent memory, Silva, in SKYFALL (2012). Of course, for me, his most memorable role remains hitman Anton Chigurh, in the Coen brothers’ NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN (2007) in which incidentally he also co-starred with Josh Brolin.

I also enjoyed Sharon Duncan-Brewster as Dr. Liet Kynes as she turns in a nice performance as a mysterious yet ultimately likable character. And Zendaya spends the bulk of this movie in brief snapshots from Paul’s dreams, and her character Chani doesn’t show up for real until the film’s conclusion. So, like everything else in this movie, if you want to know more about her, you’ll have to wait for the next film.

Visually, DUNE is satisfying, and you can’t go wrong with the cast, but the story is as flat as a deflated dune. A nice microcosm of this movie’s problems is there are these massive and dangerous worms that travel underneath the sand which makes spice harvesting dangerous. Do you think we ever get to see these monsters? Nope. That’s kind of how the entire movie plays out. There’s all this potential, all this talk about prophecies, the chosen one, oppressors, and fighting for independence, but none of this happens in this movie. It’s all a set up for the next movie.

DUNE is okay. It would have been better had the filmmakers paid attention to the movie they were making rather than the one they plan to make next.

And frankly, after watching DUNE, I can’t say I’m all that excited about sitting through a DUNE 2.

It was all just a bit too bland for my palate. Pass me the pepper and salt.

—END—

STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER (2019) – Doesn’t Offer Much of a Rise

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STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER (2019), the final film in the epic nine movie STAR WARS saga, is indicative of what the series has ultimately become. It’s a superiorly crafted movie in which everything looks amazing but without compelling storylines and characters, there’s simply not all that much to be excited about.

Ouch!

But it’s true.

When the original STAR WARS (1977) came out, I was in 7th grade, and I absolutely loved it. I loved its sequel, THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK (1980) even more, so much so that today all these years later it remains my favorite in the series.

But then came RETURN OF THE JEDI (1983). I was in college for this one, and it marked the first time I was disappointed with a STAR WARS movie. It’s not just the Ewoks either, although they were my least favorite part of the film. I thought the pacing and the way it went about telling its story was all off, especially following upon the heels of EMPIRE.

The prequels in the middle of the series, which chronicled the back story of villain Darth Vader, were meh, although I did enjoy STAR WARS: EPISODE III – REVENGE OF THE SITH (2005).

And while the latest three STAR WARS films— THE FORCE AWAKENS (2015), THE LAST JEDI (2017) and now this one, have successfully recaptured the spirit and feel of the original trilogy, at the same time introducing new characters and closing the book on some of the original characters, they have hardly been game changers.

The biggest culprit? The writing.

I don’t mean to imply that the folks writing these movies are bad writers, but rather, that good writing is not the priority with these films. In other words, time and energy is spent on the technical side of these movies rather than on the written word. As a result, very little of what happens on screen has any resonance.

Here in STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER, new character Rey (Daisy Ridley) is still searching for answers regarding her parentage, still training to become a Jedi, and oh yeah still busy battling the villainous First Order. Yup, she has a lot on her plate.

Likewise, Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) is still busy with his quest to take over the galaxy, which means sometimes leading the First Order and other times wooing Rey to join him in order to become the galaxy’s all-powerful super couple. He has trouble with his past as well, since his parents are Han Solo— who he killed in THE FORCE AWAKENS—- and Princess Leia— but his granddaddy is Darth Vader. He kinda wants to be like his grandpa, only more powerful.

To complicate matters, it’s learned that the dastardly Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) didn’t really die at the end of THE RETURN OF THE JEDI but has been secretly hibernating waiting for his chance to crush the rebellion once and for all.

Yadda, yadda, yadda.

Yup, we’ve heard this all before. Like the TERMINATOR franchise, the STAR WARS series also suffers from serious plot redundancy.

All this being said, I certainly enjoyed STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER. It’s an entertaining piece of filmmaking. It’s just not an entertaining piece of storytelling.

Regarding the two main characters, I like them both a lot, so that’s not a problem. Rey is the most compelling character in this new trilogy, and Daisy Ridley is superb in the role. She strikes a nice balance between serious intensity, angst over her unknown familial roots, and a sense of caring and strength not really seen in any of the other characters. She makes for a much more interesting Jedi than either Luke Skywalker, Ben Kenobi, or Anakin Skywalker. And it’s refreshing to have the most powerful character in the new series be a woman.

She’s the best part of this final trilogy, and the story here doesn’t really let her down either. The answers provided regarding her parentage are adequate.

Kylo Ren has grown on me throughout the series. I was not a fan back in THE FORCE AWAKENS, but he won me over in THE LAST JEDI. Adam Driver is excellent as the tortured wannabe villain who strives to outdo the memory of Darth Vader but can’t seem to shake the influence of his parents Leia and Han Solo.

The other new characters I have not enjoyed as much. Both Finn (John Boyega) and Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) have only been okay, although they enjoy some of their best moments in the series in this movie. They’re the energetic wise-cracking resistance fighters, and they do a nice job filling in the for the spirit of Han Solo, but nearly all of their banter seems rehashed from the original series. It definitely suffers from the “having seen this all before” issue.

And of course, since this is being billed as the final film in the series, it attempts to wrap everything up nicely from all the previous movies. Sort of. There are some glaring omissions. More on that in a bit.

Mark Hamill returns as Luke Skywalker, but don’t expect too much from him here, since he’s relegated to appearing in Force-ghost form, since the character died in the previous movie.

Carrie Fisher returns sporadically in archive footage as Princess Leia since Fisher passed away before this movie was filmed.

Old friends Chewbacca, C-3PO, an R2D2 are all back, with Chewie and 3PO getting the best moments. Billy Dee Williams returns as Lando Calrissian, who serves as a sort of cheerleader to Finn and Poe, telling them that in his day neither he, Luke, Leia, or Han, knew exactly what they were doing either, and they just relied on each other and made things happen, which is a point well taken as it inspires Finn and Poe to get off their butts and save the galaxy.

Now back to those omissions. For a movie wrapping up the final chapter of a nine film series not to include Darth Vader, Ben Kenobi, or Yoda, that’s just flat-out weird, and disappointing. Darth Vader was the larger than life villain in the first trilogy, and then the second trilogy was devoted to his back story, and for him here to receive nary a mention other than his beat-up helmet is simply odd.

As I said, the screenplay by Chris Terrio and J.J. Abrams fails to really resonate on any level other than the superficial. The story itself is a rehash of earlier movies— the rebellion is outmanned and outgunned, how will they ever succeed? Yadda, yadda, yadda. And the characters are hardly exciting.

The two best characters, Rey and Kylo Ren, enjoy the best moments in the film, but even these moments aren’t original. For example, Rey has her “I am your father moment” and Kylo Ren has his “I love you. — I know,” moment, but neither one is as good as the original scenes from which they’re inspired. And that’s because little that happens to these two feels new at all.

J.J. Abrams returned to the director’s chair for this one. He had also directed THE FORCE AWAKENS.  He takes great care to carve out various homage moments throughout, all the way down to the final scene, and these bits are enjoyable and appreciated.

But any emotion gets lost in an incredibly fast pace which features one action scene after another. THE RISE OF SKYWALKER is the kind of movie I generally do not enjoy, one that never stops to take a breath or seemingly have a meaningful conversation. The drawback obviously is the characterizations suffer mightily and you end up with a movie with characters you don’t care about. The only saving grace is we’ve met these characters before, so we know who they are, but it still makes for boring storytelling.

It’s one of the reasons the MARVEL superhero movies are generally always good. They never sacrifice character development, even in the AVENGERS movies which featured a ton of main characters. Great care is spent on these folks’ personalities so that nearly every time they’re on-screen something notable is happening. That’s not the case in the STAR WARS series.

The special effects are amazing as always, but are there memorable images and action sequences? Not really, no.  For example, one sequence featuring a raging ocean has potential, but when it plays out, it’s all so smooth and harmless, and then it’s on to the next action scene.

STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER is the ninth film in the STAR WARS series, and it seems like it. If you’re a fan of the series, you no doubt will enjoy its Jedi vs. Dark Side angst, eye-popping space action sequences, and colorful wise-cracking quips, but for those of us who see tons of movies year in and year out, these films are hardly on the meter for what constitutes the best in modern cinema.

Sadly, this wasn’t always the case.

After all, “May the Force be with you” didn’t enter the cultural lexicon by accident.

—END—

 

 

 

 

TRIPLE FRONTIER (2019) – Average Actioner Enjoys Strong Finish

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TRIPLE FRONTIER (2019) is Netflix’ latest foray into the big budget movie business. The film opened theatrically on March 6 and then streamed on Netflix on March 13, meaning it’s available to everyone at home even while it’s playing at theaters.

Netflix did the same thing with the Oscar nominated movie ROMA (2018). It’s a move that is getting plenty of backlash from Hollywood, as heavy hitters like Steven Spielberg have spoken against this kind of release. I guess because they fear it takes away from box office dollars or delegitimizes the industry.

All I know is that as someone who’s living on a strict budget, I liked the fact that this past weekend I didn’t have to pay $13.00 for a movie ticket to see TRIPLE FRONTIER. I watched it in the comfort of my living room. I’m sure we haven’t heard the end of this debate, but for now, I’m on the side of Netflix. Unless they simultaneously provide every theatrical release on their streaming service, I doubt it’s going to influence my movie going habits all that much.

But back to TRIPLE FRONTIER.

TRIPLE FRONTIER is an action thriller about a group of special forces operatives who decide that after years of service they just weren’t compensated properly, and so they agree to rob a drug dealer to give them the financial security they need. Hmm. Doesn’t sound like the wisest idea to you? Me, neither, which is a major problem I had with this movie.

Anyway, Santiago “Pope” Garcia (Oscar Isaac) has been chasing down a drug lord named Lorea for a long time but has yet to catch him. At long last, with the help of one of his contacts on the inside, Yovanna (Adria Arjona) Pope finally locates the whereabouts of Lorea, inside a compound deep in the jungles of South America. Better yet, Lorea keeps all his money there as well, an insane amount that could make several people rich beyond their wildest dreams.

And so Pope rounds up his former war buddies, folks who nowadays are struggling financially even after their years of service, and offers them the chance to remedy all that. If they do this one job, take out the drug lord and steal his money, they’d be set for life.

The group includes William “Ironhead” Miller (Charlie Hunnam), Tom “Redfly” Davis (Ben Affleck), Ironhead’s brother Ben (Garrett Hedlund) and Francisco “Catfish” Morales (Pedro Pascal). After some heavy-duty soul-searching, the group agrees to do the job, which of course is no surprise or otherwise we wouldn’t have much of a movie!

That being said, it seems like a pretty dumb idea, and for these guys to be in on it so easily I thought strained credibility.

Anyhow, they set out to the jungles of South America where even with all their professional experience, things, of course, do not go as planned.

The best thing TRIPLE FRONTIER has going for it is its cast. With three very strong leads, the film survives a mediocre first half before its shifts into high gear for its latter stages.

Ben Affleck receives top billing although his character Redfly isn’t really the main character in the film. Redfly is the oldest of the bunch and at first seems the wisest. In fact, the others don’t want to go forward with this mission unless Redfly is in. Redfly is also the character who is suffering the most financially, struggling to support his teenage children.

Affleck is fine in the role, and his character’s plight makes his decision later to jeopardize the mission by taking extra money make sense.

The central character in the film however is Pope, played by Oscar Isaac, as he’s the character who brings the team together and continually pushes them to get the job done, even when the odds stack up against them. Isaac is a talented actor who’s been in a lot of really good movies, films like OPERATION FINALE (2018), ANNIHILATION (2018), and EX MACHINA (2014). Of course, he’s most known nowadays for his portrayal of pilot Poe Dameron in the new STAR WARS movies.

Isaac is excellent here in TRIPLE FRONTIER, and for me, his was the best performance in the film. You get the idea that this is something Pope wouldn’t have done ten years ago–actually, none of these guys would have— but now he seems to be driven almost by anger that even after years of putting their lives on the line, they have nothing to show for it. He’s almost obsessed with the mission, and his obsession stems from the need to seek justice for himself and his friends.

None of these guys come off as greedy.

Charlie Hunnam is an actor I have mixed feelings about. For the most part, I like him as an actor, but there are times when I find his performances grating. For example, I enjoyed him a lot as Jax Teller on the TV show SONS OF ANARCHY (2008-2014) but by the show’s final season, I had grown so tired of Jax’ character and Hunnam’s performance that I almost couldn’t watch it any longer.

His performances in the movies THE LOST CITY OF Z (2016) and KING ARTHUR: LEGEND OF THE SWORD (2017) were both very good, yet I can’t say that I enjoyed him all that much in either CRIMSON PEAK (2015) or PACIFIC RIM (2013). For the most part, here in TRIPLE FRONTIER, he’s very good. I certainly believed that his Ironhead character was a special forces officer.

Both Pedro Pascal and Garrett Hedlund round out the cast nicely, and it’s a good thing that these five guys deliver the goods because the film is pretty much focused on them and them alone from beginning to end.

One flaw in the film, however, regarding the cast, is that Adria Arjona who plays Pope’s contact Yovanna isn’t given much to do at all. Her character is reduced to not much more of an afterthought, which is a waste of Arjona’s talent. Arjona has starred in the TV series TRUE DETECTIVE (2015) and the hard-hitting horror movie THE BELKO EXPERIMENT (2016). She’s excellent in her few scenes here, but had her character been included more, the story would have been even better.

As it stands, the story is a mixed bag. The first half of the movie is rather slow and not all that interesting.

The screenplay by Mark Boal and director J.C. Chandor is stuck in familiar territory with its tale of folks seeing a huge loot of money as the answer to their life’s prayers. Boal, who wrote the screenplays to the superior military movies THE HURT LOCKER (2008) and ZERO DARK THIRTY (2012) covered the rogue aspect of the military with more nuance in those films than he does here.

Things pick up for the second half of the film when the story jettisons its soul-searching and finally becomes an exciting action thriller. From the moment the robbery begins to afterwards, when things continually prove more difficult than expected, the story remains riveting.

It’s also during the film’s second half where director J.C. Chandor fares better as well, as he crafts some very exciting scenes, including a harrowing helicopter ride over a towering mountain range, a dangerous mountain climb, and a thrilling car chase through the jungle.

TRIPLE FRONTIER  is an okay action thriller. Its second half is much better than its first, and while it’s well-acted by its five main male actors, the absence of a major female character is certainly noticed here.

If you like testosterone-filled action movies and don’t mind a sprinkle of conscience thrown in for good measure, you probably will enjoy TRIPLE FRONTIER, although it’s not quite as hard-hitting as these types of action films need to be, nor is it as thought-provoking as it tries to be. The result is a rather average actioner that benefits from its three male leads and the fact that it certainly finishes stronger than it starts.

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OPERATION FINALE (2018) – Tale of Nazi Capture Relevant Today

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Oscar Isaac and Ben Kingsley in OPERATION FINALE (2018)

There are moments in OPERATION FINALE (2018), the new historical drama about the capture and extraction of Nazi Adolph Eichmann from Argentina in 1960 by a group of Israeli agents, that resonate more powerfully today because they call to mind current events.

Watching a raucous Nazis meeting you can’t help but recall images of the hate-filled march in Charlottesville or the frenzied crowds at a Trump rally.  The images are eerily similar.

But the action in OPERATION FINALE is all historical.

When we first meet Israeli Peter Malkin (Oscar Isaac) he’s leading a failed attempt at capturing a Nazi target.  Shortly after they remove the man from his home, ripping him away from his wife and kids, Malkin realizes they have the wrong man, but before he can do anything about it, his associates shoot the man dead. When Malkin tells them they grabbed the wrong Nazi, his partners shrug and ask, does it matter? He was still a Nazi.

The action jumps ahead a few years to 1960, where in Buenos Aires, Argentina, a young German girl Sylvia Hermann (Haley Lu Richardson) brings home her new boyfriend Klaus Eichmann (Joe Alwyn) to meet her blind father Lothar (Peter Strauss). When Lothar hears the boy’s name, he sends word to the Israeli government that he believes he has met the son of Adolph Eichmann, the infamous Nazi known as the mastermind of the “Final Solution,” the Nazi plan which led to the mass murder of millions of Jews.

Israeli agent Isser Harel (Lior Raz) sends a team which includes Malkin to Buenos Aires, and shortly thereafter they confirm the identity of Eichmann (Ben Kingsley).  They then plan to capture him and extract him from the country so he can stand trial in Israel for his crimes, which will be no easy task, since Eichmann is surrounded by a vigilant group of Nazis looking to rise to power once more.

OPERATION FINALE really isn’t receiving strong reviews, as I keep hearing it described as slow and unimaginative, but it really deserves stronger praise than that.  I will agree that it is subtle in its storytelling, and it’s rated PG-13 so the horrific violence from the Holocaust will not be on full display here, but there are enough potent images to make it work just fine.

The film is anchored by two very strong performances by Oscar Isaac and Ben Kingsley. Both actors drive the story forward with their convincing interpretations of the two leads.

I like Isaac a lot, and he seems to get better in every movie I see him in. While he’s probably most known today for his recurring role as pilot Poe Dameron in the new STAR WARS movies, it’s not in that role that he’s really been allowed to strut his stuff.  He’s been excellent in films like ANNIHILATION (2018) and EX MACHINA (2014), and way back when he made an impression in the stylish action fantasy SUCKER PUNCH (2011).

He’s excellent here as Israeli agent Peter Malkin.  He plays Malkin as a man not quite sure of himself at first, and his confidence grows as he’s allowed to establish a relationship with Eichmann while they’re held up in a safe house awaiting the opportunity to fly out of Buenos Aires. The Israelis need Eichmann to sign a document expressing his willingness to leave the country, and when their hardball tactics continually fail, Malkin believes he can get him to sign by appealing to his ego.

The two men partake in a psychological cat and mouse game which heats up in one of the movie’s best scenes when Eichmann attempts to get under Malkin’s skin by telling him the story of how he shot a woman and her baby, knowing that Malkin’s sister and baby were lost in the Holocaust. He asks Malkin if he thinks it was his sister and her baby he shot , and if so, wouldn’t that have been a good thing, for them to have been killed so quickly as opposed to the horrifying ways Eichmann saw others killed?

Ben Kingsley is very, very good as Adolph Eichmann, a man who refuses to stand trial in Israel because he knows there will only be one result, his death, and he believes that in order to receive a fair trial he should be tried in Germany. He also refuses to be the scapegoat for the sins of his former government, and he makes the argument that he was only following orders, just as Malkin is doing now.

At one point Eichmann tells Malkin that he actually tried to help many Jews escape, as he didn’t agree with his fellow Nazis’ solution for getting rid of the Jews. He believed they should have been relocated, and he in fact did relocate many of them, to which Malkin scoffs that he sent them to malaria-filled Madagascar. Eichmann replies that no other country would take the Jews.

It’s a subtle performance by Kingsley, yet it’s no less successful. He makes Eichmann a formidable  force to be reckoned with, and there is something icy cold and sinister underneath nearly every civil line he utters.

The rest of the cast is equally as solid. Lior Raz as Israeli agent Isser Harel, and Nick Kroll as fellow agent Rafi Eitan, and Michael Aronov as agent Zvi Aharoni are all convincing, as are the rest of the actors who round out the team, including Melanie Laurent as the sole woman of the group, Hanna Elian, tasked with drugging Eichmann during their escape.

I also enjoyed Haley Lu Richardson as Sylvia Hermann, the young Jewish woman whose relationship with Klaus Eichmann led to the capture of his father. Richardson is a promising young actress who has yet to land her break-out role. She’s been memorable in supporting performances in films like SPLIT (2016) and THE EDGE OF SEVENTEEN (2016). Her role here in OPERATION FINALE is again small, and she again makes an impression.

It was also fun to see Peter Strauss back on the big screen as Sylvia’s blind father Lothar. I think the last time I saw Strauss in a movie was the Johnny Depp thriller, NICK OF TIME (1995). Of course, Strauss mostly did TV work, bursting onto the scene eons ago in the highly popular mini series RICH MAN, POOR MAN (1976).

Director Chris Weitz’s straightforward unassuming style allows the story to unfold gradually and build towards a rather riveting conclusion.

The film does a good job of getting under your skin without blood and gore. For instance, the scene where the young mother raises her child to Eichmann is unnerving to watch even without the actual shootings occurring on-camera.

Weitz also directed THE TWILIGHT SAGA: NEW MOON (2009), the second TWILIGHT movie. Needless to say, OPERATION FINALE is a much better movie than NEW MOON and should go a long way towards helping moviegoers forget that Weitz made that vampire clinker.

The scenes between Malkin and Eichmann are the best scenes in the movie, and they’re also the best written, thanks to a credible screenplay by Matthew Orton.

And while the screenplay doesn’t make Eichmann a sympathetic character, it does make him a three-dimensional one. We see him caring for his family, we catch glimpses of the cold psychological power he possesses, we experience his raw fear when first captured, and we are allowed to enter his calculating mind while he’s a prisoner.

Critics are not being overly kind to OPERATION FINALE, and that’s too bad, because it’s a solid well-made movie.

It works as both a historical piece, in that it’s a compelling tale of the capture of Nazi Adolph Eichmann, and as a cautionary tale for our times, reminding us of the importance of striking down fascism.

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ANNIHILATION (2018) – Natalie Portman Leads All-Female Team in this Thought-Provoking Science Fiction Adventure

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The all woman team in ANNIHILATION (2018)

While superhero movies have captured all the hype and box office receipts in recent years, science fiction films have quietly enjoyed a resurgence of their own. The last few years has seen a decent number of science fiction films landing at the cinema, most of them very good high quality affairs.

You can go ahead and add ANNIHILATION (2018) to that list.

ANNIHILATION was written and directed by Alex Garland, the man who also wrote and directed EX MACHINA (2014), one of those recent high quality science fiction flicks, a thought-provoking thriller about artificial intelligence.  Here in ANNIHILATION, Garland takes on a topic that is rather innovative and original.

In ANNIHILATION, biologist and college professor Lena (Natalie Portman) is dealing with the absence of her husband Kane (Oscar Isaac), an army officer who’s been missing in action for over a year. One night, Kane returns home, but he’s different, distant, but before Lena can find out why, Kane becomes violently ill.  She rushes him to the hospital, but before they can get there, the ambulance is intercepted by the military, and both Kane and Lena are extracted from the vehicle.

When Lena awakes, she finds herself being questioned by a psychologist, Dr. Ventress (Jennifer Jason Leigh). Lena learns the truth of her husband’s mission, that he and his unit had been sent in to investigate a mysterious area called the “Shimmer.” Numerous parties had been sent in, and none had returned, until Kane.

When Lena learns that Dr. Ventress is leading an all female team— a scientific decision because so far the investigators had all been male and they had all failed— into the Shimmer, she decides to join them, believing she owes it to her husband to learn what happened to him and what exactly is going on inside the bizarre area.

The Shimmer began when an unknown object struck a lighthouse on the south coast of the United States, and afterwards the lighthouse began to emit an unusual aura which over the course of the year continued to grow, and Dr. Ventress predicts that unless it is stopped it will continue until it covers cities, states, and eventually, everywhere.  The Shimmer looks like a huge oily wall which distorts one’s vision, and so you can’t really see beyond it.  Those who have entered, have not returned, except, of course, for Kane.

When Lena and the all women team enter, they immediately realize that they have entered a place where the laws of nature have changed, and it’s up to them to find out how and why and to survive its hostile environment.

ANNIHILATION tells a fascinating tale that works on multiple levels. Sure, the thought-provoking science fiction ideas are there, in this case some innovative thinking involving refraction and DNA, but ANNIHILATION works even better as an adventure and a thriller.

There are some very exciting sequences here involving some frightening creatures which live inside the Shimmer, in particular an enormous crocodile and later an extremely intense sequence involving something that was once a bear. There are some definite edge-of-your seat moments in this one.

My favorite part though is the female cast.  It’s a fresh take on a science fiction adventure tale like this to have the main players all be women.

Natalie Portman leads the way with a strong performance as Lena. She gets to express two sides of this character.  There’s the cold, clinical biologist side, as she investigates the strange phenomena inside the Shimmer, and since Lena is ex-military, having spent several years in the army, we get to see her no-nonsense kick-ass side, as she takes on the formidable creatures inside this strange land.  Portman excels at both.

I like Portman a lot, and it was fun to see her in this action role after her meticulous performance as Jackie Kennedy in JACKIE (2016).

Jennifer Jason Leigh is also excellent as Dr. Ventress.  As the leader of the group, she is as tough as nails in her determination to reach the lighthouse in the hope of resolving this dilemma. While Leigh has enjoyed a long career, she’s turned in some particularly impressive supporting performances of late, including memorable roles in GOOD TIME (2017) and THE HATEFUL EIGHT (2015).

The other three women are also notable.  Tuva Novotny as Cass, Gina Rodriguez as Anya, and Tessa Thompson as Josie round out the cast in impressive fashion. Thompson was also excellent starring opposite Michael B. Jordan in CREED (2015).

And Oscar Isaac is effective as Kane, Lena’s husband who’s not quite the same once he comes home.  Isaac also starred in Alex Garland’s previous science fiction flick, EX MACHINA, and he’s known now for his recurring role as Poe Dameron in the new STAR WARS movies.

ANNIHILATION is not perfect. It’s slow at times, more so during its third act.  Early on, when the audience is first learning about the Shimmer, the story is so engrossing that pacing is not a problem.  But once we start to get answers, things slow down a bit as the film moves towards its conclusion.

The CGI effects are uneven.  Some of the creatures look fearsome, while others look fake.

The story works if you don’t think about it a whole lot. I couldn’t help but think that if such an event were really happening, there’d be more of a military presence around the Shimmer.  We’re led to believe that there is, but it’s not something we see much of. In fact, we see hardly anyone other than Dr. Ventress and her team.

Still, I enjoyed the screenplay by director Garland, based on the novel by Jeff VanderMeer. The dialogue is strong and the concepts explored in the story rather fascinating.

And the film looks stunning. The mind-boggling world inside the Shimmer contains some memorable cinematic images.

The whole film has a sort of LOST (2004-2010) vibe to it, and if you mix in a little bit of ZOO (2015-2017) with INTERSTELLAR (2014) and INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (any version you’d like) you’ve got ANNIHILATION, a nice mix of edge-of-your-seat thrills and thought-provoking science fiction.

But its strongest attribute is its all-female team, which by far is the most refreshing part of this exciting fantasy adventure.

—-END—

Luke Skywalker is Back in Action in STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI (2017)

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At long last, Luke Skywalker speaks!

As much as I liked STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS (2015),  I was left disappointed by the fact that after characters spent the entire film searching for the elusive Luke Skywalker, he shows up for a mere half-second in the final reel and doesn’t utter a word.

Hey, it’s Luke Skywalker!  Cue end credits.

So, for me, the thing I was most looking forward to about STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI (2017), the latest chapter in the STAR WARS saga, was seeing Luke Skywalker back in action. And since he finally gets to speak some dialogue and then some, his presence here was easily my favorite part of the movie.

STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI picks up immediately where its predecessor, STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS (2015) left off.  And so we find the Resistance fighters led by General Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher) battling the evil First Order led by Leia’s and the now deceased Han Solo’s son Ben, who goes by the bad-guy moniker Kylo Ren (Adam Driver).  Yup, you might say the current STAR WARS battles are more of a domestic dispute!

Actually, the villain who is calling the shots is the supremely evil Snoke (Andy Serkis), as Kylo Ren works for him, but any acute viewer can spot the writing on the wall a mile away, that the real villain in this new trilogy is no doubt the conflicted Kylo Ren.

Things are not looking good for our merry band of Resistance fighters.  They are outgunned and outmanned by the superior First Order forces, even with the presence of young new heroes Finn (John Boyega) and Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac).

And so it’s up to young Rey (Daisy Ridley) to convince the Last Jedi, Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) to come out of retirement and help their cause, which is no easy task since Luke is a cranky old man now, disillusioned with the world, and he wants no part in any more of its conflicts.

It takes old friend R2D2 to point out that years earlier it was another old Jedi who was asked to help the cause, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Kenobi said yes.  And when Luke still hesitates, the spirit of Yoda arrives to set him straight.

In spite of the box office records that STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI is currently setting, the film really is a mixed bag.

For me, the best part of this film was seeing Luke Skywalker back in action on the big screen. His scenes are clearly the best in the movie.

Just as interesting are the scenes with newcomer Rey (Daisy Ridley).  Her scenes with Luke resonate.  As she tries to convince Luke to join the Resistance, she’s also trying to learn more about who she is, and just why it is that the Force is so strong with her.

And as much as I enjoyed Luke in this movie, and most of this is due in large part ot Mark Hamill’s performance, the two most interesting characters in the film are Rey and villain Kylo Ren. As Rey searches for answers to her identity, she becomes increasingly connected to Kylo Ren, as their strength with the Force allows them to communicate with each over vast distances, and each wants to convert the other. Rey wants to turn Kylo Ren from the Dark Side, while Kylo Ren wants Rey to join him in his ambitious plot to pretty much take over the galaxy.

And Kylo Ren is also connected to Luke Skywalker, since Luke had tried to train his nephew years earlier, but failed when Ren turned to the Dark Side.

Kylo Ren is a very interesting character, with some pretty neat conflicts.  He sees himself as the next Darth Vader, but he continually falls short, and part of this is he’s the son of Han Solo and Princess Leia, and their connection is also strong with him.  Yet, to shut them down, he murdered his own father in the last movie, and this time around he promises the same fate to his uncle, Luke Skywalker.

All these parts of the movie work and work well, and the good news is these three characters do make up the bigger portion of this movie.  However, the other stories, the ones involving the Resistance led by Leia, and featuring subplots with Finn and Poe Dameron, pretty much fall flat.  They suffer largely from a “been there, done that” situation. We’ve been down this road before in previous STAR WARS films.

The First Order’s pursuit of the small Resistance fleet which takes up the entire movie is rather boring, and the smaller plot where Finn and Poe try to incapacitate the Rebel ship chasing them is rather redundant and could have appeared in any STAR WARS movie.

I found myself only interested in the story which featured the triangle of Rey, Kylo Ren, and Luke Skywalker.

Written and directed by Rian Johnson, known for his science fiction thriller LOOPER (2012) starring Bruce Willis and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, a film I liked a lot, STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI looks as amazing as you would expect.  The special effects are all top-notch, and it does contain some decent scenes.  When Luke and Kylo Ren finally face each other, the moment is up there with some of the most dramatic and memorable scenes in the series.

But running at 152 minutes, making it the longest STAR WARS movie, it does tend to be a bit overlong and does struggle somewhat with the pacing.  Let’s put it this way.  It felt like 152 minutes.

It was great seeing Mark Hamill back on the big screen as Luke Skywalker.  Hamill is a very good actor who has been missed in the movies over the years, as his career took a different path which saw him do more voice-over roles in animated features.  For those of us who grew up watching young Luke Skywalker take on the Death Star and eventually become a Jedi to confront his own father Darth Vader, it’s a special experience to watch him here as an older man once again drawn into another conflict, but this time as the older, wiser force. If there’s any downside here, it’s that the film doesn’t include enough Luke Skywalker.

That being said, both Daisy Ridley as Rey and Adam Driver as Kylo Ren are strong enough performers that they appear more than up to the task to take on the next movie on their own. I like Daisy Ridley a lot, and I enjoyed her here every bit as much as I enjoyed Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker.

I was lukewarm to Adam Driver as Kylo Ren in the previous movie, but he really has grown into the role, and he’s much more of a formidable presence here.  Even better, his inner conflict does not appear forced, and so he’s that rare villain who isn’t just flat-out dark and evil. It’s a neat performance.  He also gets rid of his silly mask in this movie, and that’s definitely a plus.

The rest of the actors are all okay. Of course, Carrie Fisher passed away shortly after filming her scenes for this one.  She’s fine here as Leia, but honestly, the character doesn’t fare as well as Luke Skywalker does in this movie or as Han Solo did in the last.  She’s simply not as interesting a character, nor does she have a whole lot to do in either film.  Still, it was sad to watch her in this film, knowing that in real life, she’s gone, and the character will not appear again.

Both John Boyega as Finn and Oscar Isaac as Poe Dameron are fine in their roles, but they’re stuck in storylines that aren’t so interesting.

Andy Serkis is on hand doing what does best, performing as a CGI/motion capture character, this time playing the villain Snoke, and when he’s on-screen he’s sufficiently menacing, but he’s not onscreen all that much.  I enjoyed Kelly Marie Tran as newcomer Rose Tico, who helps Finn here, and it was also fun to see Domhnall Gleeson return as General Hux, who constantly operates in the shadow of the bigger evil villains.

And the amazing John Williams returns once again to score yet another STAR WARS movie, and once more, the music is excellent.

The screenplay by director Johnson is okay.  Again, the Luke/Rey/Kylo Ren arc is the best part, while the rest seems like a rehash of previous STAR WARS movies.

Also, in general, the whole conflict in these “star wars” just isn’t all that interesting.  In fact, it’s pretty darn boring because the writing in these films has never been good enough to spark interest in its larger universe.  The best stories have been the small ones, the conflict between Luke and Darth Vader, Vader’s conflict between the Dark Side and the good, and here the conflicts with Rey, Kylo Ren, and Luke.

Whenever the stories revert to the larger conflict at hand, which is what a lot of the second trilogy did and is largely why those three films were so lifeless, the tales fall flat. I don’t really care about the Rebellion, or the Resistance, or the politics of these worlds because, again, the writing has never been good enough to make me care.

So, every time characters and events in STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI dealt with the ongoing conflict between the First Order and the Resistance, I yawned, but when it focused on the very specific conflicts between Rey, Kylo Ren, and Luke Skywalker, I was all in.

STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI will not be the last STAR WARS movie, but with Rey and Kylo Ren poised as the future of the STAR WARS universe, it may be the last one to look so keenly on its past.

—END—

 

Books by Michael Arruda:

TIME FRAME,  science fiction novel by Michael Arruda.  

Ebook version:  $2.99. Available at http://www.neconebooks.com. Print version:  $18.00.  Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.

IN THE SPOOKLIGHT, movie review collection by Michael Arruda.

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 Ebook version:  $4.99.  Available at http://www.neconebooks.com.  Print version:  $18.00.  Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.

FOR THE LOVE OF HORROR, short story collection by Michael Arruda.  

For The Love Of Horror cover

Ebook version:  $4.99.  Available at http://www.neconebooks.com. Print version:  $18.00.  Email your order request to mjarruda33@gmail.com. Also available at Amazon.com.  

 

 

 

X-MEN: APOCALYPSE (2016) Provides End-of-the-World Excitement

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Movie Review:  X-MEN:  APOCALYPSE (2016)

By

Michael Arruda

I’m not hearing great things about X-MEN:  APOCALYPSE (2016), the latest film in the Marvel X-MEN series, which is too bad, because all things considered, it’s a purdy darn good movie, one well worth the price of a movie ticket.

Let’s turn back the clock a little bit, to 2011, when the X-MEN series was rebooted featuring younger actors in an X-Men origin story, X-MEN:  FIRST CLASS (2011).  I absolutely loved this movie, and it ranks in my Top 5 List of the best Marvel superhero movies ever made.  A big reason for this was the performances by James McAvoy as Professor Charles Xavier and Michael Fassbender as Magneto.

The second film in the rebooted series, X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST (2014) played with time travel and combined cast members from the original series with the cast from X-MEN:  FIRST CLASS.  A creative idea to be sure, but the film stumbled with its execution, and I was not nuts about this movie.

Now comes X-MEN:  APOCALYPSE, the third film in the rebooted series.  This time around, we learn that mutants have been in existence since the beginning of time, and one such all-powerfult mutant, Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac) sets his sights on taking over the world  but is betrayed and buried in a pyramid in ancient Egypt.

Jump to the 1980s, twenty years after the events of X-MEN: FIRST CLASS, and ten years after the events of X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST, and Apocalypse escapes from his Egyptian grave and once more sets his sights on taking over the world.  His strength is that he can enhance the abilities of others, and so he always assembles four mutants, four horsemen, to be his minions, and he uses them by making their special ablities even stronger.  He gathers four mutants, including a young Storm (Alexandra Shipp) and the grand prize, Magneto (Michael Fassbender).

Magneto has been doing his best to blend in with society.  He has a wife and a young daughter, and he has given up his powers so he can live in the real world.  But things go sour when he is discovered, and his wife and daughter are killed.  This leaves Magneto feeling very bitter indeed, and so he is more than willing to join forces with Apocalypse.

Meanwhile, Professor Xavier (James McAvoy) is running his school for gifted mutants, when there is a great disturbance in the force— oops, wrong series.  But there is a great disturbance, an energy surge, coming from Apocalypse.  When Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) shows up and informs Professor X that Magneto has joined the bad guys again, it’s up to Professor X and his students to save the day.

Except that Apocalypse wants Professor X’s mental abilities for his own, and so he abducts the professor in order to force him to work for him.  And so now it’s up to Mystique and the latest and youngest X-Men recruits to save the world by going up against the most powerful mutant in existence, Apocalypse.

This is no small task, which is why the last third of the movie is so exciting.

There are many things to like about X-MEN:  APOCALYPSE.

However, when talking about the Marvel superhero series, you have to start with the acting, and that’s because these films have assembled an A-list cast on a regular basis, meaning that when you watch a Marvel superhero movie, you’re pretty much guaranteed A-list caliber acting.  The acting in these films is far better than what you would expect in a superhero movie, and the acting in X-MEN: APOCALYPSE is no exception.

Both James McAvoy as Professor X and Michael Fassbender as Magneto are excellent in this movie.  They also work extremely well together, and so whenever we are fortunate enough to see them in the same scene, the film is that much better.

In addition to McAvoy and Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence completes the star triumvarate as Mystique.  Now, as much as I like Jennifer Lawrence, I’m not nuts about her as Mystique.  She has shown so much range in other roles, in films like SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK (2012) and JOY (2015), it’s difficult to accept her in a role where she’s covered in blue make-up.  She also plays Mystique like a mutant cousin of Katniss, her character in THE HUNGER GAMES movies.  It’s just not my favorite mix.

The rest of the young cast is first-rate.

Nicholas Hoult is very good as Beast, Sophie Turner is mesmerizing as Jean Grey, and Kodi Smit-McPhee who was so memorable as the young boy in the vampire movie LET ME IN (2010) and also in DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES (2014) is charmingly electric as Nightcrawler.

And as he did in the previous X-MEN movie, Evan Peters provides scene-stealing fun as Quicksilver.  Reprising her role from X-MEN:  FIRST CLASS Rose Byrne is effective in her return as CIA Agent Moira Mactaggert.

Oscar Isaac makes Apocalypse a formidable villain.  A frequent stumbling block in the otherwise pristine Marvel superhero films is their inablity to craft a worthy villain for their heroes.  It hasn’t hurt the movies since the Marvel superheroes generally are such an entertaining lot on their own, as they are full of flaws and can’t seem to stop arguing and fighting amongst themselves.  Still, a decent villain would only help, and here in X-MEN: APOCALYPSE, Apocalypse is a decent villain, and then some.  And you can’t fault his agenda:  he just wants to destroy the world, that’s all.  Technically, he wants to wipe out everyone on Earth who possesses great power so he can then rule it with ease.  Greedy bastard.

Apocalypse is all-powerful, so much so he fathoms himself a god, and his powers are indeed god-like.  What this means is that even the combined strength of all the X-Men mutants, even with Professor X and Magneto working together, they can’t stop this guy, which makes for some dramatic cinema.  And how they finally do gain the upper hand against this superpowerful villain makes sense and works.

I enjoyed both the direction by Bryan Singer and the screenplay by Simon Kinberg.

Singer is no stranger to the X-MEN universe, having directed the first two films in the series, X-MEN (2000) and X-MEN 2 (2003), and the most recent film in the series, X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST (2014).  He crafts some powerfully emotional scenes in this one, including the scene where Magneto’s family meets a tragic end.  The conclusive battle is also very exciting.

Kinberg’s script strikes a nice balance between witty snappy dialogue and poignant moments, like when Professor X tells Magneto that he is not alone, that he hasn’t lost everybody.

That theme, being alone, is prominent throughout the film, and is what Professor X ultimately uses to set him and his X-Men apart from Apocalypse- the villain is alone, while they are not.

As there are in most of these Marvel superhero movies, there is an additional scene after the end credits, but it’s hardly worth the wait, and so if you’re not in the mood to sit through the credits, don’t bother.  You won’t be missing much.

I liked X-MEN: APOCALYPSE a lot.  While I didn’t enjoy it quite as much as this year’s DEADPOOL (2016) or CAPTAIN AMERICA:  CIVIL WAR (2016), it’s still a very good movie, a worthy entry in the Marvel superhero universe.

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